The San Diego-based, 2,250-unit chain saw sales spike with this new quarter-pound beef patty with garlic herb butter melted on top on a new gourmet signature bun. The award-winning Classic has creamy tomato sauce, green leaf lettuce, tomatoes and provolone cheese, but Jack in the Box has introduced new variations to parlay the success of the initial build.

This 129-unit casual-dining chain based in Tampa, Fla., continued to redefine what fondue can mean with this seasonal lineup that included a barbecue brisket Cheddar fondue and a banana split milk chocolate fondue, accompanied by a wedge salad featuring Wisconsin Gorgonzola cheese. For customers not looking for fondue, The Melting Pot offered a Seafood Catch Old Bay Boil with shrimp, scallops, lobster & shrimp ravioli, andouille sausage and crab claws served with corn on the cob, red bliss potatoes and a mustard crème fraîche dipping sauce.

Sodexo spent nine months working with chef Roberto Santibañez to develop this replacement for its Salsa Rico Mexican offering. It celebrates the flavors of Central and South America and the Caribbean with an array of options including hand-held items such as Argentine choripan sausage and Mexican fish tacos, and small plates such as Brazilian acaraje (black-eyed pea fritters) and four different varieties of Mexican corn. First introduced at the State University of New York Stonybrook for school foodservice, it’s now available systemwide.

These $1.29 mini-sandwiches, available in roast beef & cheese, crispy chicken & cheese, corned beef & cheese, ham & cheese and jalapeño roast beef & cheese, have proven to be a runaway success at this 3,346-unit chain based in Atlanta.

Stanford’s dining services went beyond serving healthful food and actually is offering a nine-week course that teaches its customers how to cook nutritiously for themselves.

Founder Andrew Gruel set up his own seafood trading company to create this six-unit, fast-casual chain based in Huntington Beach, Calif. The restaurant allows him to offer creative takes on sustainable seafood while also keeping the food affordable.

The owner of Lazy Bear in San Francisco evolved a series of underground dinner parties into one of the city’s hottest restaurants, creating a dinner party atmosphere with operational innovations including communal seating in a fine-dining setting and selling non-refundable tickets instead of taking reservations.

Norman Van Aken, a member of Miami’s “Mango Gang” in the late 1980s and ’90s, was a leader in the fusion cuisine movement of that period and continues to innovate as chef-owner of Norman’s at the Ritz-Carlton, Grande Lakes, in Orlando, Fla. He is working on a new restaurant, 1921 by Norman Van Aken, slated to open in Mount Dora, Fla., later this year. He has written five cookbooks and has been inducted into the James Beard Foundation’s “Who’s Who of Food and Beverage in America.” His earlier restaurant, Norman’s, in Coral Cables, Fla., was inducted into NRN’s Fine Dining Hall of Fame in 1999.